Picks and tips

Windows Weekly tip of the week: Windows Home Server 2011 OEM version is now available on Amazon.com, NewEgg.com for about $120.

Windows 7 app pick: Microsoft Standalone System Sweeper Beta. A recovery tool that can help you start an infected PC and perform an offline scan to help identify and remove rootkits and other advanced malware. Basically an anti-rootkit tool.Thanks to everyone that wrote in about this.

Windows Phone 7 app pick: Doodle Jump. Yay! The best-selling mobile game of all time finally comes to Windows Phone.

Audible pick of the week: The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris by David McCullough. The latest book by historian David McCullough tells the "story of the adventurous American artists, writers, doctors, politicians, architects, and others of high aspiration who set off for Paris in the years between 1830 and 1900, ambitious to excel in their work." McCullough: "Not all pioneers went west."

What I Use

Like many, I was hoping to see a new Lumia flagship before the end of 2014, and while I was pleasantly surprised in some ways by both the Lumia 735 and 830, neither offers the level of performance or best-in-market camera quality I had come to expected from Microsoft/Nokia's high-end devices. So I pulled the trigger on an unlocked Windows Phone flagship that will hopefully take me through at least the first half of this year. Or until Microsoft gets off its low-end fixation and satisfies the needs of its biggest fans....More

It's been a while since the last What I Use, but there haven't been many major changes since late last year: Surface Pro 3 has become my go-to travel companion, I've added a third cellphone line for testing Windows Phone, Android and iPhone side-by-side, and have rotated through some new tablets and other devices. We've also switched from FIOS to Comcast and added to our set-top box collection....More